


Panic! From the ADHD Medication

by emthecat



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: ADHD positive William Pointdexter, Anxiety, I got a little project-y, M/M, Panic Attacks, This was going to be smut but fuck it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-03
Updated: 2016-09-03
Packaged: 2018-08-12 16:45:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7941733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emthecat/pseuds/emthecat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which I headcanon Dex as having ADHD in one of the many experiences I have had with my medication, turns out you're not supposed to mix caffeine with certain forms of ADHD medication. Whoops! Nursey tries to help Dex chill in ways that do not involve riling him up. I write terrible summaries- I promise it doesn't suck as badly as it might sound.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Panic! From the ADHD Medication

It was ten in the morning and Dex was 80% sure he was having a heart attack. His chest felt so tight that he could barely breathe and he was shaking like a leaf, and was he breathing funny? Make that 90% sure. He tried to remember what the other symptoms were and if he felt them, in his concern for imminent death he didn’t hear Nursey open the door to their shared dorm room. Nursey’s first thought when he looked at Dex was that he looked a little off balance and a lot paler than normal, which said a lot because William Pointdexter could essentially disguise himself as the paper he used in his printer on most days. It wasn’t until Dex kind of stumbled to sit on his bed that real concern hit him. 

“Dex, bro, are you okay? You don’t look so good.”

“I-I think I’m hav-having a h-heart attack or something, this has never happened be-before.” Dex was hyperventilating by this point, and while Derek didn’t believe Dex was having a heart attack something was obviously wrong. 

“Dex, are you feeling chest pain? Do either of your arms hurt?”

“No, not pain- i-it’s just r-really really tight and I-I can’t breathe and my heart rate-“ it was at that point something clicked for Nursey, and he realized that he was right, it was not a heart attack but rather a panic attack. This was a shock to Nursey because he didn’t think Dex had anxiety, and Dex obviously didn’t know he did either because he clearly didn’t recognize his current state. He walked over to the now balled up Dex, sitting on his bed still freaking out and gently sat down next to him and put his hand on his shoulder, again very gently so as not to scare him more. 

“Dex, you’re not having a heart attack, I promise, but what you are having is a panic attack. Have you ever had one before?” Dex rapidly shook his head, not trusting his voice to work when he could barely breathe properly. Nursey noticed that Dex had tears running down his face by this point, although he doubted Dex realized this and he thought it was safer not to mention it right now. Dex was still looking at Nursey who was trying to figure out what he should do, he had never directly experienced anyone have a panic attack before and he had never had a panic attack before- his instinct was to try to hug him but based on the various tumblr posts he had seen about anxiety, it might make him feel worse or trigger a complete breakdown. He decided it was a pretty safe bet that google might be able to help, even if it meant him not being entirely focused on Dex for a few minutes- it didn’t look like the attack was getting any worse for the moment. 

Google brought up options from various sources, Nursey picked the first one he recognized the URL of- it was a medical website he had referenced once or twice regarding various symptoms that one time he thought his friend was having an appendicitis attack (it turned out she in fact was not, but that her period cramps were just very aggressive). The link had many suggestions such as helping to regulate their breathing, speaking encouragingly to them and to have the person do a simple physical activity over and over to tire them out. He decided to start with the breathing so he decided to try the breathing his old track coach had him do after sprinting exercises, in for 5 seconds out for 7 seconds. By this point Dex still looked like he was in pretty bad shape, he’d only been in the room for about 10 minutes at this point and wasn’t sure how long Dex had been like this. 

“Hey, Dexy, hey, look at me- yes good yeah, I’m going to help you calm down okay?” This was met with a shaky nod from Dex, which Nursey took as a good sign.

“Okay i’m going to count to five, and then I’m going to count to seven, when I count to five I want you to breathe in through your nose and hold it until I count down from 7 to 1. Then you’ll let it out okay?” Another nod was received, and so began Nursey’s attempt to get Dex to breathe normally. They did this for about a few minutes and it seemed to have some effect, but Dex was still shaking and he could hear it in his breathing. Nursey decided it was time to employ another tactic.

“Dex, you’re doing so good, I’m really proud of you. I know you can get through this- you’re going to be okay. Why don’t we try counting backwards from 100 together? We’ll take deep breaths between each number okay? 100, 99-” Nursey could see Dex was starting to really come down from his earlier panic at this point, when they got to 0 he appeared to be breathing much better and the only thing that seemed visibly wrong was the shaking of Dex’s hands. He continued to just talk to Dex calmly, and kept the breathing exercises going just to be sure he wouldn’t start hyperventilating again. Nursey was very confused as to where this came from, he had never heard Dex mention anxiety or anything remotely mental health related before but he decided now might not be a good idea to get into where this had come from. Instead he decided to focus on what Dex needed from him.

“Dex, do you want some water?” – nodding.

“Dex, do you need anything else in particular?” – head shake.

“Do you want me to stay with you? – vigorous nod.

Nursey decided he needed to distract Dex from whatever feelings he was having right now, and he got up to pull his laptop over to them. Dex still hadn’t spoken since his comment about having a heart attack, which was almost a half hour ago. He was a little concerned about that but he didn’t want to push his luck as Dex looked way better than he had originally. Pulling up Netflix, he was presented a profile option and realized kids Netflix was probably safest at this point and picked a movie from the family-friendly section not really caring what it was at this point. He sat down next to Dex, a good four feet between them so that Dex didn’t feel like Nursey was suffocating him or anything like that because he really wasn’t sure where Dex was at right now mentally. He was internally determining the best way to figure out how Dex felt when finally Dex said something.

“I don’t have anxiety…” It was murmured, but Nursey was close enough to hear it. 

He figured Dex was probably thinking it was a terrible thing and that he was broken or something alone those lines- his family didn’t seem to be the type to discuss mental health unlike his parents who for the longest time were concerned Nursey was depressed (It turns out that the amount of coffee he had been stealing when his parents weren’t looking had just really not done good things to his body). Nursey began to attempt to reassure him, “It’s okay to have anxiety, it happens, it’s normal, you can talk to someone about it, I-“ 

“No like, I’ve been told I don’t have anxiety by a professional. I’ve gone through testing for all that stuff in high school after a counsellor got a note from a concerned teacher I had in 9th grade. She thought something was up, she wasn’t wrong, it just wasn’t anxiety. I have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder- ADHD.” After Dex finished saying this his hands began to shake harder again and while Nursey was concerned he was also very confused.

Finally his brain kicked in and he realized the shaking was probably something he should help with so he covered Dex’s hand with his and the slowly paling ginger boy looked over at him again with an expression Nursey couldn’t read. Dex didn’t move his hand, so Nursey just left it there and they both kind of just looked at each other for a minute trying to figure out where the other was at. Dex suddenly got a very odd look on his face, and then what Nursey thought might be realization. Dex looked away suddenly.

“Oh no… Oh. That, that explains a lot- shit.” When Dex looked over at Nursey again he realized that Nursey looked as confused as he had felt moments before, and also more than a little concerned and realized he had said that out loud. 

“Yeah I might have an idea of where the panic attack came from, I just need to check something…” He grabbed Nursey’s phone and began typing furiously and a few minutes later nodded at the phone, handing it back to Nursey who looked at what was in front of him. The website appeared to be for some form of a medication, Nursey didn’t recognize it though. 

“methylphenidate?” 

“Yeah, the brand is more commonly known as Concerta… It’s the medication I take for my ADHD. It’s a stimulant and it’s supposed to improve my ability to concentrate and other shit that my ADHD affects but it can create some anxiety symptoms as well. Apparently, it also isn’t supposed to be mixed with that much caffeine because that can cause some pretty severe anxiety to occur from all the stimulation.” Dex got up and went over to their trash can, and pulled out not one, but three large coffee cups from Annie’s. 

“I had an assignment due today at 9am- and I was farther behind than I thought I was so sleep was put on the back burner and I basically drank coffee all night like it was water. I took my Concerta sometime around 6am because I knew if I didn’t take it that early I might have been up all night from the amount of stimulant in my body… when I finally finished the assignment I realized I had forgotten to submit a portion of it and the submission box was closed.” At this point Nursey realized what had happened, and the concerned look was back so Dex figured he should probably continue speaking before Nursey started freaking out.

“SO, when I realized I’d forgotten a portion all this happened, I must have really overdid it on the caffeine and the medication and yeah, I’m fine now, I swear, and I didn’t know it would happen or I wouldn’t have done it… Nurse are you okay?” Dex was running out of things to say to a still very not okay looking Nursey, when he suddenly realized their hands were still touching and Nursey’s grip had gotten tighter than it originally had seemed and finally moved it from the other boy’s death grip.

“DEX YOU COULD’VE HURT YOURSELF- YOU NEED TO BE MORE CAREFUL… WHAT IF THE COMBINATION HAD BEEN LETHAL? Yes, I know caffeine isn’t lethal, BUT IT COULD HAVE BEEN SOMETHING ELSE AND LIKE JUST YOU NEED TO READ THE BOTTLE AND-“

“Nursey-“ Still yelling “Nurse” still yelling at him “DEREK”, that did it. Nursey finally stopped yelling long enough to look at Dex who looked very frustrated with him. 

“Derek, this isn’t like I took a foreign drug at some party, I had too much caffeine. I’ll admit I probably need to be careful next time, but I know better than to mix things with this. Why are you so concerned anyway? It’s not like this affects my hockey skills or anything like that… It was just anxiety.” 

“BECAUSE I WAS WORRIED”

“YOU DON’T NEED TO BE, I CAN TAKE CARE OF MYSELF, HOCKEY WILL NOT BE AFFECTED BY MY STUPIDITY”

“GOD, DEX, ARE YOU THAT THICK THAT YOU THINK THIS IS ABOUT HOCKEY?”

This shut Dex right up, he cocked his head, clearly trying to piece together what that could possibly mean because why else would Nursey care about him if not hockey, it’s not like they were dat- oh. OH. 

“… Nurse.” Dex’s face screamed pity to Nurse at this point, and he immediately tried to fix this.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that, we can pretend it never happened, we don’t have to talk about it, it’s stupid, I-“ 

Nursey, so preoccupied with his ramble didn’t realize that Dex had moved to sit right beside him and when Dex put his hand over his again, he stopped, putting way too much hope into something he couldn’t believe was possible. Dex was Dex, he didn’t date anyone, let alone date boys, and didn’t do emotion. He didn’t do ANYTHING other than the occasional drunk hook up with various girls at Haus parties. There were so many thoughts running through Derek’s head when he finally felt a hand touch his face, he looked up to see Dex’s face less than half a foot from his, and getting closer, his eyes flicking to Nursey’s lips as if to wordlessly tell him where this was going, so slow as to give him an out if Dex had read the signals wrong, and that’s when Nursey realized he should probably react to this action before Dex thought he wasn’t interested, so he smashed his lips to Dex’s hands, putting his hands to Dex’s hips and moving right into the kiss. It was a mess of teeth and heat, hands moving to grab various parts of bodies, with Dex climbing on top of Nursey pushing all thoughts of previous anxiety out of his head. He would think about it later- right now he had someone to take care of him.

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are always always welcome, as is critique, you can find me on tumblr at dexs-freckles or emthecat!


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